Dev. pedi....

After GI we hung out for about 3 hours, then headed over to the clinics to see Dr. Foster, the developmental pediatrician. She's only there twice a month and it's hard to get an appointment, so we've been waiting for this for 6 months!

She was really nice and I liked how she treated Charlie. Most doctors don't even talk to her, they just sit down and immediately start talking to me. I think it's getting to the point that it's rude not to acknowledge her presence. She's not a newborn anymore. Most 15 month olds are running around and attempting to have conversations with people. I'm sure these doctors don't ignore them. But because Charlie appears to not know what's going on around her they probably figure there's no point. Too bad they don't pay attention, because Charlie is very smart and loves for people to talk to her and interact with her!

So Dr. Foster talked to Charlie and complimented her good looks and her communication skills. She told her that she was a smart girl. :-D And we got her official CP diagnosis! Which is bittersweet. I've known for a long time that she'd be diagnosed, but it's still tough to see it made official. But this will help her get more services and maybe make insurance not so stingy with things like a bath chair.

She said that so far, Charlie's joints all feel very good. She was concerned with the curve in Charlie's spine, but we've seen an improvement since we got her chair, so she said as long as it's not getting worse to not worry about it right this minute.

She was overall just very positive. She knows that I understand that Charlie is severely affected so she didn't try to bull$h!t me and tell me if we just do enough therapy she'll walk and talk eventually. Some doctors act like if you just go to therapy a million times a week, the kid'll be fine, which is soooo not true! Therapy has very little to do with how they develop. But she did say that some little things, like head control, she imagine Charlie will *eventually* get figured out. She thinks she will start grabbing at toys and picking up her head in time. She does want to see her off the phenobarb, which can affect development, so we'll have to push for that when we see neurology later this week.